The use of optical fibres as a means of transmitting data has received widespread interest. Information transfer using a modulated light beam guided by a glass or plastics fibre has been utilized in many applications including telecommunications and computer link-up and data base use. Advantages of the use of fibre optic linkages are very high information carrying capacity compared to metal wires carrying electrical signals and freedom from external interference.
Optical fibres comprise a core, generally an inorganic glass such as fused silica or a synthetic resin, and a cladding of a material having a lower refractive index than the core, which cladding confines the light energy to propagate in the core by total internal reflection. The refractive index of fused silica is 1.458 at room temperature and there is a limited range of materials which have refractive indices below this value. The efficiency of propagation increases as the difference in refractive index between the core and the cladding should be at least 0.03 units less than that of the core, preferably at least 0.05 units less.
Prior art cladding materials include thermoplastic polymers which are coated on the optical fibre by melt extrusion through a dye. This method of cladding suffers from the disadvantages that it is difficult to obtain thin coatings and the coatings tend to be loosely bonded to the silica core. Other polymers have been applied by solvent coating. However, solvent coating has the disadvantages that it may be necessary to coat a fibre several times until the desired thickness is obtained and the necessity of handling high solids solutions with attendant problems of bubbling of the coating. Furthermore, there is the additional problem of pollution of the environment during evaporation of the solvent.
Cross-linkable polymeric coating compositions have been employed which are rapidly cured after coating by heating or exposure to ultra violet light. Examples of such compositions are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,099,837, 4,125,644 and 4,511,209.
British Patent No. 1262526 discloses an optical element e.g. a lens, view aperture etc. comprising a solid transparent base e.g. a thermoplastics material, on which is coated a fluorine-containing transparent, thermoset organic polymer having an index of refraction within 0.02 units of the base. The polymer is formed from a fluorine-free acrylic monomer and a fluorine-containing acrylic monomer, at least one of which monomers being polyfunctional. The specific coating compositions disclosed utilise at least 70% by weight of the fluorine free acrylic monomer.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,511,209 discloses a cladding composition for plastic clad silica optical fibres comprising:
a highly fluorinated monofunctional acrylate with a refractive index below 1.38 and constituting more than 50% by weight of the composition,
a polyfunctional acrylate being trifunctional or higher serving as a cross-linking agent,
a mono- or polyfunctional thiol that functions as a synergist preferably a thiol containing silane e.g. gamma-mercaptopropyl trimethoxy silane, and
a photoinitiator.
The cladding compositions are dip or spray coated onto the fibre and exposed to ultra violet radiation to cure the coating. The hard clad optical fibres produced have attenuation often below 10 dB/km and exhibit superior temperature behavior than silicone clad optical fibres.
The present invention provides alternative cladding formulations for optical fibres.